Quietus
by mimosa eyes
Summary: In the days after Arendelle's thawing, much happens that we don't see. Fits within, then goes beyond, the film's closing sequence. Kristoff/Anna fluff, sisterly bonding, angst and character studies.
1. Chapter 1 (Night of Thawing)

**'Quietus': among other meanings, 'a period of retirement or inactivity', or 'a finishing stroke; anything that effectively ends or settles'.**

* * *

"Where'd you learn to punch like that, anyway?" Kristoff teases as he turns down a hallway. His tone is half awed and half genuinely curious, and he smiles down at Anna, who is once again bundled in his arms in a bridal carry. He can feel her reassuring warmth seeping through the layers of clothing between them; it's a welcome change from the iciness of her skin earlier in the day.

The petite girl yawns and wiggles a little to stretch, enjoying the way his steady grip adjusts easily to her movement to keep her stable. It's faintly surprising, even to her, how quickly she's become so comfortable with being held by him. Her eyelids droop lazily down before she snaps awake again. "Oh, I have my secrets," she replies, in a manner that would be coy if not for the drowsiness that slurs her words together. Although much rejuvenated after thawing out on the fjord, Anna's body is still pretty weak from all that she's been through. It didn't take Kristoff long to notice the way she slumped at the dinner table, and how her knees almost gave out when she tried to stand.

"Of course you do," Kristoff says fondly, shaking his head at her half-conscious antics. Frankly, though, he can't help but wonder at the stubborn determination and endearing optimism that she's displayed. He's never known someone to go in the blink of an eye from naïve, sheltered princess to wolf-fighting, mountain-"climbing" pugilist. Not that he's known many people, but surely, he thinks, not many, if any, are quite like Anna.

"That door right there," she directs him presently, giggling sleepily as she does. Perhaps at the thrill of getting to order him about.

He plays along. "Of course, my princess," he answers grandly, a form of address that lies somewhere between familiar and formal. He's even tempted to click his boots together or bow elaborately, to add to the effect. If not for his care in not wanting to fumble and drop her, he would.

It's only as he's depositing her in bed that he notices her abruptly solemn expression.

"What's wrong?" Kristoff immediately asks, pulling the covers toward her curled-up form then sitting beside her. An icy dread settles in his chest as he notes the distraction in her visage. "You're not cold, are you? In pain?"

But she's waving away his paranoid concern even before he's finished speaking. "No, just— you called me 'Princess'." Anna's large eyes look troubled. "I-I know you said it as a joke, in jest, but..." Her voice trails off, giving way to a silence that whispers in his ear what he has known on some level for some time: up in the mountains, she might have simply been Anna; but back here in Arendelle, she's a princess, born and raised in a world of castles and banquets and rich suitors who would one day soon come vying for her hand in marriage. Whereas he, regardless of the circumstances, is ultimately a mere ice harvester and mountain man. He's seen solid proof of where he stands in society from the moment he delivered Anna home and the great wooden doors shut in his face. Any prince in his place would have been lavished with gratitude and invited indoors to escape the winter chill while awaiting Anna's recovery. Come to think of it, any person of nobility or some standing in his place would have personally escorted her to warmth and safety, rather than stay his own feet at the threshold, sensing perhaps from the royal servants' body language that he was welcome no further.

"Don't," Kristoff hushes her, and because he doesn't know how else to ease her mind, he gives her a smile. "Don't worry about me," he says, echoing what he said to her just before surrendering her to the care of the royal servants. Eerily, at the time he thought those words would be the last he ever spoke to her. Kristoff dismisses this revelation as coincidental.

"I'm not worried about you, I'm—" Anna cuts herself off before she can say _I'm worried about_ us. Much as there is little doubt in her mind about where she stands with Kristoff, it seems premature, yet also rather reductive, to refer to their budding relationship with so slight a term as 'us'. "I'm sure that thick skull of yours has you covered," she improvises, feeling the sluggishness of her mental faculties as they scramble to come up with a convincing end to her sentence.

The laughter bubbling up just beneath her voice is genuine though, and contagious, tickling a chuckle from him. "You bet," Kristoff responds, and after another yawn escapes her lips, he declares firmly, "Bedtime. You need rest." But his gaze is soft, not stern, as he tucks her in, pulling the covers up to her shoulders and fussing for a moment with the topmost quilt.

Anna picks up on this. "I'll be fine in the morning," she assures him, smiling tiredly. Suddenly she looks simultaneously youthful and old, as though lingering at a crossroads between guileless and experienced. "Everything will be fine in the morning," she adds in a barely audible whisper as her eyelids fall shut.

"You'd better be," Kristoff replies heartily, not having heard her second statement. But she's falling rapidly asleep, and so, resisting the temptation to sneak a goodnight kiss, he moves as quietly as he can to the door.

It creaks as he's closing it behind him. Anna stirs. "Elsa?" she calls out, drowsy and hopeful, still thinking herself in a dream, he imagines. "Could you leave the door open a little?"

Kristoff doesn't reply, doesn't break the spell. He winces at the thought of a cold draft blowing into the bedroom, but he leaves the door slightly ajar according to her wishes. The corner of his lip twitches into a sad smile as he leaves Anna the illusion of her sister's presence, aware somehow of its importance to her.

Then he walks down the hall to the guest room he's been invited to stay in for the night, although he wonders how he will ever get to sleep with the thought of losing Anna any one of several ways, still haunting him.

* * *

**Poll time! (It's important.) What kind of timeframe do you intuitively think ****_Frozen_****'s closing scenes take place over? I'm referring to: Anna presenting Kristoff his new sled and title; and Elsa making the city square an ice rink. A couple of weeks? Days? Let me know, along with any comments or suggestions!**


	2. Chapter 2 (Day After Thawing I)

She can't bring herself to meet Kai's gaze as she asks how to get to her parents' gravesite. Her eyes keep tracing the patterns on the hallway carpet, as if spelling out her shame — shame at not already knowing, not having visited at any point in the last three years. Following her parents' deaths, Elsa spent a solid two weeks in her room, turning away servants at the door and allowing only Gerda to deliver her meals, although she barely touched the food. It often turned ice-cold within minutes anyway. Elsa spent those days of mourning in a never-ending cycle of trying to _conceal, don't feel_, repeating her father's words like a mantra that could protect her from herself; then conversely letting even more sorrow and guilt spill forth in twisted ice formations, whose jagged edges and writhing shapes reflected the torment she felt inside. Her room was constantly frigid, as was her visage — impassive whenever she was compelled by Kai or some concerned footman to open her door. For two weeks until Gerda coaxed her to make some form of address to the people, Elsa lived out her parents' wishes to a new extreme, as if in self-imposed vigil, or atonement.

But nobody understood these motives. How could they, with no knowledge of her secret? More so than Anna, perhaps, Elsa was an orphan: when their parents died, Elsa's only two confidantes died with them. She can still remember her father's authoritative voice on that fateful morning, announcing his decision to the meek air— _"We'll lock the gates. We'll reduce the staff. We'll limit her contact with people, and keep her powers hidden from everyone."_ It didn't matter that the only option they ever thought viable was to control her burgeoning powers. Nor that sometimes their fear of their own child was so strong it shone through in the way they regarded her, handled her. It only mattered that all the while they were her sole human interaction, sources of comfort from whom she was irrevocably cut off.

She's been lost too deep in her reverie, and has to ask Kai to repeat his instructions. The butler's voice is kindly as he offers to summon a coach to take her there; and understanding as she politely declines, the implied need for privacy acknowledged.

Dimly she hears him ask if she would be returning shortly — he and Gerda, as the closest persons there are to advisors to the throne, wish to discuss matters of state with her — and despite her distraction, she doesn't miss the way he flinches as she turns back to answer him. From Arendelle's peasants right up to its royal household's servants, a wary uneasiness has settled in the people's hearts since their queen's return. The work song of the ice harvesters, in particular, has been adapted into rampant rumors regarding 'Elsa the Snow Queen'. In whispers among the proletariat, it has been spread that she possesses the 'frozen heart' spoken of in the rousing anthem, which in turn draws its roots in folklore. But these concerns will have to be deferred for the moment, Elsa decides. She leaves Kai standing in the corridor, and he breathes a sigh of relief after her departure.

It is not a long walk to the hilltop where the late King and Queen have been commemorated. Nor is the site particularly difficult to find. Each generation of Arendelle's rulers is buried on elevated ground of their own choice; and in keeping with the small kingdom's funereal principle of living in celebration of natural cycles, a garden of evergreen plants that thrive in one of the four seasons is then cultivated all around. By this order Elsa's parents, though never recovered from the shipwreck, have graves surrounded by summertime vegetation, which succumbed to the unusual cold spell Elsa unwittingly set off. It is a cruel coincidence, and a blight that memorializes the far-reaching impacts of her powers on the lives of her entire family.

Before leaving her room at the crack of dawn she has made sure to don one of the dresses she wore as Princess, in place of the gown she fashioned herself out of ice crystals. In an effort to appear as much like her parents knew her as possible, she has even brought with her a pair of gloves, although she holds rather than wears them. She realizes these are mere pretenses, that the girl underneath these outer façades has outgrown them; and yet, why not resume the self-deception? It's become her default state, after all. But despite all her efforts, from the moment she enters the garden, she feels as alien in it as the bare trees and withered vines are a pitiful sight to behold.

Elsa's feet delicately crunch the fallen leaves that litter the stone pathway. In lieu of shedding tears, she lets a light frost spread over the ground she traverses. It thrills her, the level of control she's gained since learning how to thaw her own snowy creations — and since learning to accept and express her emotions. To leave the door open. It just... isn't something she can trust herself to do around other people.

The King and Queen's graves are situated next to each other in one corner. Elsa kneels before them, before the twin shriveled wreaths at the base of the headstones, and places her gloves between them. But unlike so many other bereaved children — for that is the capacity in which Elsa makes this secular pilgrimage — she does not say a word. There is too much grief, too much blame, too much gratitude, to be conveyed, and all to two inanimate stand-ins that could never reciprocate the human warmth and presence that she has missed out on for years.

Despite her parents' coaching her against feeling to avoid triggering her powers, there has always been some part of Elsa's heart that never froze over. This is the part that contains all that too much: too much anger, and too much love. This is the part that melts now, from the inside out, until her shoulders are shaking with sobs and her entire chest feels liable to implode.

But slowly, slowly, it all trickles away, in streams down her face and into the ground, grassless but moist and fertile, ready and raring to grow anew. Her breaths slow down and stop hitching in the back of her throat. _Let it go_, she told herself atop the north mountain as she played with and tested the extent of her powers. She took the burden of clamping down on her true self back upon her shoulders when confronted by Anna, but now here she is, setting it down for good. Elsa's mind replays Kai's words like a reminder of the long days before her, of coaxing her people to accept her as their leader once again, ice powers and all.

What hurts now, more than the time-faded memory of loss, more than the fear she saw that night in people's eyes, is the loneliness. The realization that even reconciled somewhat with her sister, she still cries alone.

She wonders almost absently if she always will. She closes her eyes. In a perfect world, Elsa thinks, when she reopens them, Anna will be right there next to her. But Anna is still asleep, surely, recuperating from the weakness that came over her soon after she thawed out on the fjord.

Anna is beyond her reach in many ways.

* * *

**Thanks to all your responses, I've worked out a plot! Albeit a still unsatisfactory one that I'll need to tweak as I go along. At the moment, though, need your input again: how do you have fun with snow? (I live in a tropical country. Heh.)**

**m.e.**


	3. Chapter 3 (Day After Thawing II)

Then a twig snaps some distance behind her. Elsa's pulse sprints for a couple beats; but the step is too heavy, the breaths too long, and then the voice, startled at the sight of her—

"Oh, Els—uh. Your... Majesty? I'm so sorry to intrude, I—"

Faintly disappointed, she stands and turns to face Kristoff, who is backing rapidly away, face flushed and with a small bundle of flowers in hand. He looks weary, and his hair is tousled, subtle indicators of a sleepless night. "I'll pay my respects later," he stammers on, and seems about to apologize again when Elsa holds up a hand to stop him, bemused.

"Hi," she says after a moment, letting her hand fall. It registers vaguely in her mind that she greeted Anna at her coronation ball with this same, mild word. She has taken a moment to compose herself, and so there is that somewhat cold exterior again, so easily taken for a regal demeanor. "It's alright, go ahead." She gestures Kristoff forwards, then makes as if to leave.

"Woah, hang on a minute—" Kristoff pauses as if to search his limited knowledge of decorum. But his vocabulary abruptly fails him. Being a mountain man literally raised by trolls away from most human interaction, he's more than slightly intimidated by the thought of speaking to a queen. Let alone when said queen has just had a decidedly private moment. Or when said queen could turn you into a popsicle at her whim.

"I wouldn't want you to leave because I interrupted you," he finally says. "May I... join you?" He waits a moment for Elsa to nod her consent, then walks respectfully up to the gravestones. He doesn't question the gloves, just places his flowers next to them and takes a step back.

"So... h-how's Anna?" she asks after a moment's somewhat awkward silence.

"Still resting, I think," Kristoff says slowly, "She was really tired last night." Elsa's innocuous question would have sounded like an attempt to make conversation, if not for her slight stutter and worried tone... not to mention the very fact that rather than check on Anna herself, she seems to prefer keeping an eye on her from a distance. He puzzles at this latest evidence in a pattern he's been noticing: that despite the two sisters' apparent closeness, in particular Anna's trust that Elsa would never hurt her, the two seem remote and even estranged when they interact. Last night at the dinner table, when left to their own devices, they exchanged only a few, trivial words. At the time he put it down to Anna's tiredness. Now, however...

Presently, Elsa clears her throat. "What're you doing up so early?"

"Couldn't sleep," he replies tacitly. "Thought I'd come to pay my respects to the late King and Queen."

Each person's secrecy hangs in the air between them. Unanimously, they seem to have agreed not to call each other out on it.

The sun is beginning to peek over the hilltops in the distance, a fact that Elsa notes glumly. Reminded again of her commitments, she's at a loss, and feels Kristoff's presence begin to be irksome, albeit through no fault of his own. Too used to being alone, she has yet to learn how to be around people again. "Why don't you go check on Anna," Elsa says, in a way that sounds less like a suggestion and more of an instruction, a queen's dismissal of one of her subjects.

But Kristoff, latching on to his nascent theory about the sisters, protests. "You should go see her yourself," he counters, hoping he is not overstepping some boundary. He remembers Anna calling out for Elsa the previous night, and decides this is a risk he's willing to take. "From what I can tell... it's about time you two really talked to each other."

He can see her waiting pointedly for him to leave, but deliberately doesn't take the hint. In fact, he's emboldened by her not having frozen him into an icicle so far. "Elsa," he ventures, his voice both firm and compassionate, "What happened between you and Anna?"

Something changes in Elsa's expression at his words. Perhaps it's his disarmingly straightforward manner, perhaps it's the way he deliberately addresses her by her first name rather than her title. Whatever the exact cause, their dynamic shifts palpably. She is no longer a stately queen interrupted by a humble ice harvester, but rather a grieving young woman unexpectedly but contentedly joined by a companion. The awkward starts and stops of their conversation thus far seem silly now, as their differences in rank are laid aside.

"We were playing," Elsa finds herself saying. The words stumble from her lips. Never before has she told anyone this story. The memory is still seared in her mind's eye, and the mental cicatrice has always ached from time to time, when the smallest detail summons it. She gazes out over the mountains as if searching for the words to translate such emotion into mere words. "She was jumping on little hills of snow I made to catch her with." Her voice is shaky, but now that she has started, she begins speaking faster, encouraged by Kristoff's attentive silence. "She was so happy back then." Elsa smiles at the memory, a real smile, and she meets his gaze briefly as if to share it with him. Then her lip quivers. "But I slipped. I hit her head with ice. We took her to—"

"—the trolls," Kristoff says with her, the word barely audible. He can't believe he's never made the connection before.

"They erased all traces of magic from her mind, to protect her from me. I'm indebted to them," Elsa muses. "And to you," she adds, her gaze flickering up to briefly meet his. "I mean, Anna can take care of herself, she's... spunky, she's—"

"A major feistypants?"

Elsa smiles almost approvingly at the fondness in Kristoff's voice; at the endearment it implies. "Yes." A pause. "But she couldn't have made it down that mountain without you. I... certainly didn't help then." She bows her head. "Nor any time in the last thirteen years. I don't know how I can make it up to her." There's a strain in her voice that tells him she's just barely holding back tears.

Kristoff pats her shoulder to reassure her. "You can start by trying," he says warmly.

* * *

They return to the palace together. Elsa feels her head clearing as she walks alongside Kristoff, as if the mountains he has long inhabited have rubbed off on him, and like them he now exudes a sense of serenity. The silence that hangs between them is tenuous and calming, rather than thick and awkward.

Although so much seems to have happened, it is still early, and they pass by a few scrambling, tardy servants, to whom Elsa nods a greeting. Kristoff mutters something about going into town to scrounge up some carrots for Sven's breakfast, before parting ways with her.

Then she's standing outside Anna's bedroom, and it feels like she's been waiting her whole life for this moment, when she knocks and mercifully, miraculously, the door swings easily open.

* * *

**Easing off on the angst, expect sisterly cuteness soon! (Not that it'll necessarily last...) I'm not sure about this scene, would Kristoff and Elsa interact kind of awkwardly? **

**m.e.**


	4. Chapter 4 (Day After Thawing III)

Elsa enters the room quietly. Her sister is still asleep, strawberry blonde hair slightly less tangled than on usual mornings because she has barely shifted in her exhausted slumber. Elsa perches on the edge of the bed so she's leaning over Anna a little.

Anna's eyelids twitch in her sleep. All is quiet.

Gently, Elsa reaches over to tuck a stray lock of hair out of her sister's face so that it doesn't tickle her nose.

"Mm..." Anna murmurs. She shifts under the covers and stretches lazily. Elsa feels a pang of guilt over waking her, but when Anna opens her eyes, they look bright and refreshed. Her little sister blinks sleepily and finally focuses on her. Instantly confusion furrows her brow. "Elsa...?" Anna says questioningly, rubbing at her eyes as if in disbelief.

Elsa dismisses the echo of remorse that she feels then. "Well, who else would it be?" she teases, tapping her bleary sister's nose. Then she smiles knowingly. "Did you think I was Kristoff?" she asks mockingly. Ignoring, as she does, the fact that Kristoff is one of the few topics they can discuss, having practically no other shared experiences.

Even though only half-awake, Anna blushes furiously. "No," she protests, sitting up in bed and trying to push away the memory of last night, of Kristoff carrying her to bed and insisting sweetly that she get rest. She can't quite remember when exactly he picked her up — easily, naturally, in a way that made her feel like his powerful arms were a mold for her lithe body — but from the look on Elsa's face, perhaps it was before, not after, they turned the corner from the dining hall. They were both rather giddy at the time, their attention focused on each other rather than on their surroundings.

"Hey, what do you say we go play in some snow?" Elsa suggests just then, interrupting her thoughts.

"Really?" Anna's face really lights up now, and she almost jumps out of bed towards her closet to extract a dress from it. "But won't it all melt in this heat?"

Elsa chuckles and stands. "Not in the hall. Do tame that bed-head first, though," she advises laughingly. "I'll wait outside while you get ready."

But as she closes the door behind her, she sees that Kai and Gerda have been waiting for her in the corridor. The smile involuntarily falls from her face at this realization.

"Your Majesty," Kai wastes no time in saying, "there is much to be done." Quickly Gerda chimes in, "What is your first move?"

"I..." Elsa's words die on her lips. She tries desperately to remember something of her mother's teachings about ruling a kingdom, delivered at intervals during those years of isolation. The focus was always on protecting Elsa's secret rather than preparing her to take the throne — even though the latter was viewed as only a matter of time since her powers rendered marriage impossible, or at best highly problematic. _In troubled times, assure the people and assert authority with decisive action._ The words come to her vaguely, as though through a fog.

Anna emerges from the room just then, looking a good deal more presentable. "Hello," she says uncertainly, eyes darting to her sister as she tries to puzzle out what's going on. Her very presence pressures Elsa on some level to dismiss her advisors. _I wish it could be like this all the time_, Elsa remembers her sister commenting at her coronation ball, after they both crooned at the heavenly scent of chocolate in the air. She also recalls herself replying that it could not. _Perhaps it's time to change that_, she thinks now. It feels like too long that she's been doing things she should do, instead of things she wants to do. Elsa smiles, knowing just what to say. Grandly, she declares, "As I was saying: I wish Prince Hans and the Duke of Weselton to be sent home immediately, and Arendelle's trade ties with Weselton to be cut off." She takes special care to pronounce the name of the latter kingdom as _Weasel_-town.

The two advisors look appalled. "Your Majesty," Gerda begins to say, "surely this is all quite rash—"

But Elsa can feel Anna's eyes on her, shining with an eagerness to play that is rapidly going dull with disappointment, and unwittingly egging her on. "No," Elsa responds haughtily, "See to it that these tasks are carried out, please. I have important business to attend to."

Kai and Gerda exchange worried glances. But the butler maintains decorum, politely asking, "Of course. Will that be all?"

Elsa considers for a moment, then her eyes light up and she leans over to whisper something in Kai's ear. His eyebrow arches upwards momentarily at her request. "Very well," he responds finally, lips slightly pursed in disapproval as he bows and takes his leave.

The two sisters wait till Kai and Gerda round the corner, to burst out laughing. "I didn't know you could speak like a queen!" Anna squeals and giggles at Elsa's audacity. Part of her is guilty over Elsa's shirking of her duties, but she reasons that surely it's time they made up for the past years.

"I didn't know you could run like a chicken!" Elsa counters, a wild light in her eyes as she conjures up a gigantic snowball, holding it aloft above their heads. Anna's eyes go huge when she sees it, and just as anticipated, she begins running away, screaming, "No fair, I don't have any ammo!"

They race down the stairs and Elsa magically hurls the snowball upwards at the great arching ceiling, where it explodes into a shower of snow that keeps falling, materializing high above them and floating down gently. Rapidly, the hall starts filling up with snow. Anna gathers some up in her hands and packs it together into a compact ball, which she hurls, laughing joyfully, at Elsa's shoulder. Her big sister responds with an outraged cackle and crouches to scoop up her return shot, forgoing the use of her powers naturally.

Whole mountains of snow begin to accumulate, some stumpy and good for hiding behind while dodging, some with inviting slopes that are just gentle enough to be safe, but also steep enough to thrill if slid down. "We should have a sled!" Elsa yells, throwing a snowball at Anna, who dodges it by ducking behind a convenient hillock.

"Oh, I owe Kristoff a sled!" she screams back, reminded of her promise to replace the sled of his that she had a part in breaking.

Extravagantly, Elsa replies, "Then we'll get him one!" She feels the gravity of the promise, the exhilarating feeling of lavishing her sister with love. It's something she's dreamed of, on the long nights when she thought she could not bear to spend one more second out of Anna's bubbly warmth and optimism. It's enough to make her grin even wider.

* * *

**I've been trying to figure this out, but to no avail, so: tell me your personal headcanons about how Elsa's powers work! Does she create ice by removing heat from water that's present? Any theories are welcome. Trying to hammer out this detail for a later part.**

**m.e.**


	5. Chapter 5 (Day After Thawing IV)

Time grows elastic, punctuated only by shrieks and screams. The summer sun begins to shine in through the windows, but its heat, as well as the reminder it constitutes of the reality that is still rushing on outside, cannot get through to them. Paradoxically, as their snowball fight intensifies and they start panting harder, the physical exertion makes them feel warmer than before they started. Anna calls for a truce first, before Elsa feels particularly tired, and the latter frowns as she worries about her sister's condition. But she's reassured seeing Anna grinning and swearing she can hear the snow hissing around her as she falls back onto the soft powder and drags her arms and legs about in it to form a snow angel. Laughing, Elsa follows suit, watching her quick puffs of breath in the air.

It is then that the door to the hall creaks open, revealing a rather shocked servant taking in the icy utopia before him, as well as the usually reserved queen and princess panting and steaming in the snow. "Your, uh, Majesty?" he greets tentatively, clearing his throat as if to dispel the strangeness of the situation.

Elsa leaps up with a smile and approaches the door while Anna looks on with intrigue at the silver pitcher and two bowls the servant is holding. "Thank you," Elsa says, taking the items from him, "That will be all."

Then she walks briskly back to Anna with a grin, and settles herself beside her sister. "Ready?" Elsa finds herself asking as if out of habit. At Anna's eager nod she fills both bowls with fresh snow, then picks up the pitcher and drenches it generously with chilled chocolate milk.

"Oh my gosh," Anna gasps, eyes going wide at the sugary treat. "Chocolate snow ice for breakfast?"

"I thought you might like it," Elsa happily replies, giving Anna her bowl. They both pause for a moment realizing that nobody thought of getting out spoons. Then they lock gazes, shrug and unabashedly start slurping in a manner quite inappropriate of royalty. Their enjoyment is only doubled by the occasional outburst of a giggle when either person notices chocolate dribbling down the other person's chin, or each other's intense looks as they chase evasive chunks of ice around the bowls with their tongues.

But then behind them, the doors burst open again. Elsa has just enough time to think that perhaps the servant has realized his error and returned with utensils, before she hears Kristoff's voice ring out. "Elsa," he calls, panting hard presumably from having run some distance, "Your Weselton embargo. The traders have heard rumors. They're panicking, they'll all lose their livelihoods." He pauses a moment to catch a breath even as his eyes take in the snowy paradise before him, the fun atmosphere of which is rapidly escaping as though through the open doors.  
Anna has stood up. She's wiping her chin dry, brushing the snow from her skirt and hair, and refusing, with an almost childlike guilt and shame, to meet Kristoff's gaze.

He looks grimly satisfied at having interrupted their merrymaking. "Nobody's happy about Hans being carted off, either," he continues. "A dockhand told people how he was treated and now people are questioning your judgement. They don't know he tried to usurp the throne. They just remember him as the man who handed out warm coats, during the winter that _you_ set off."

Elsa flinches at the slight emphasis. The room gets even colder somehow, more ice sprouting from the floor in jagged spikes.

At this point in his report, Kristoff's initial urgency has begun to dissipate, and he reflects on the near-rudeness of his tone. He glances briefly at Anna, giving her a hint of a smile to indicate that he isn't angry, just worked up.

It's encouragement enough for her to release the tension in her lean limbs, and look over at Elsa. "Elsa?" Anna prompts meekly, troubled by her own involvement in bringing about the currently unfolding repercussions. "What now?"

Her sister is wearing an ordinary dress, she realizes very belatedly, in place of the one she made out of ice. She looks for all the world as if nothing dramatic has occurred since her coronation, as if she simply stepped out of her room one morning and magically reconciled with Anna. Perhaps that was Elsa's vain hope, that years of estrangement could somehow be dissolved by reminding Anna of the good times they shared as kids. But both of them have grown up by now. Especially with the strain in their relationship, they should have known it would be impossible to go in a moment from building snowmen to maintaining a kingdom together. For both sisters, the memory of long-ago fun finally, finally begins to fade into the ether of the past. They have been holding on to a childlike bond, the relevance of which has been outlived. Its place, in the absence of any other interaction since, is filled now only with a cordial tolerance, as that of strangers bound together to a shared duty. It hangs in the air between them, primed to snap at the slightest provocation.

"I don't know," Elsa finally says, in a strangely detached manner that is simultaneously hollow-sounding, despairing. Up to this point a small tic in the corner of her eye has been the only indication that she has heard Kristoff's devastating revelations at all. "I don't know about any of this." Her mind races back to her visit to her parents' graves hours earlier, to her rumination on losing them at a young age. The King and Queen never came near fully preparing their elder daughter to take the throne.

Sensing a stalemate, Kristoff steps in. "It's not too late," he assures them both. "We can still change people's minds." He looks at Anna as if pleading her to go along with it, if only to calm her sister down.

"Yeah," Anna chimes in with an alacrity that is only slightly forced. "We could let them know all that's happened, for one thing. It would clear up the confusion."

A low moan, almost a growl of frustration, starts up in Elsa's throat. "It's more complicated than that, Anna," she sighs, secretly thinking her sister's suggestion puerile and unschooled. She clasps her arms over her chest, turning away from the others.

Of course, picking up on the undertone of derision, Anna's hotheaded streak flares up. "The truth isn't complicated," she shoots back in defense of her idea. "In fact — revealing the _truth_ long ago would have stopped any of this from happening!"

Elsa wheels around at this declaration. They both understand Anna is implicitly referring to Elsa's secrecy from her own sister, not just her people. "Says the _princess_ who got engaged to someone she met _that same day_ because she doesn't _understand_ anything too 'complicated'!"

Only after she's lashed out does she realize that she's spoken so angrily, channeling into her words the misplaced bitterness about her self-imposed incarceration that she has reasonably yet illogically blamed Anna for. "Anna," Elsa gasps, feeling her breaths whistle in the back of her throat. "I didn't— I mean—"

Anna looks like she's been slapped. Tears are welling up in her eyes but when she speaks she's sure not to let her voice waver. It's cold and flat as she delivers a final blow. "_You_ made it complicated."

Then she's running towards the open door and Elsa is yelling after her, "Only to protect you! Like our _parents_ wanted me to!" Her mind is racing through the words she has long dreamed of saying: the origin of Anna's streak of white hair, the fear and the guilt and the hurt.

But Anna's not listening anymore. At the door she pushes past a stunned Kristoff, who looks helplessly at Elsa before turning to go after Anna. He pulls the door shut behind him, and so, with a booming finality, Elsa is once again alone.

A moment passes. A tear falls down her pale cheek. The whole hall freezes around her.

* * *

**Thanks for fun with snow ideas everyone! With special credit going to diamondgirl647 (snow here is flavored with chocolate, not maple syrup, but that sounds delicious too) and ancientdragonduelist (fantastic details about the joys of snowball fights).**

**This chapter... overdramatic? I don't know.  
**

**m.e.**


	6. Chapter 6 (Day After Thawing V)

He's perfectly capable of catching up to her, but something holds him back from pouring on the speed. So Kristoff follows quietly after Anna, keeping her in sight, deliberately letting his boots thud against the floor to signal his continued presence. He alternates between a slow jog and a brisk walk, adjusting to the pace that she sets, engaging in a kind of wordless dialogue with her. Even though he knows that in this temper she isn't about to turn around and allow herself to be calmed down, he realizes on some level that she needs to know he's still here.

She turns down a corridor to the stables, where finally she slows and stops.

"We should elope," Anna announces bluntly the moment he creaks open the door. Her back is to him and he can see the tension in her muscles and the way her hand, raised supposedly to push hair out of her face, actually swipes roughly at the tears running down her cheek. "We should run. We need to get away from it all."

Hearing this sends a stab of potential bliss zigzagging through him, making him quiver in anticipation of a future together that he simultaneously realizes cannot come to fruition. A life up on the same mountains where he fell in love with her — even if he didn't realize it at the time. A honeymoon in the glade of willow trees whose frozen forms came together in a winter wonderland of their very own. Whose sun-kissed appearance in autumn is sure to enchant them all over again. In the silence of a few moments Kristoff's mind conjures memories they could make, living up in those high altitudes away from this bustling world. He would teach her which berries were safe to eat and how to tell from the smell and texture which were the sweetest. Then bring her to the freshest springs and streams whenever winter receded from the land and the melting snow-capped peaks yielded water so deliciously cold it turned your lips red while you drank. Along the way, who knows? Maybe she could even learn to climb mountains properly. Although he's pretty content with simply being there to catch or carry her.

Kristoff shakes himself out of his own reverie and takes a few steps forward, letting the sweet smell of hay clear his head. It gives him an idea. "First things first, Feistypants," he says in as business-like and collusive a tone as he can muster without any of the wishful dreaminess filtering through. "We need to feed Sven." He crouches beside his reindeer and produces a carrot he tucked into his belt.

The pair perform their ritual of each taking one large bite of carrot, with a _snap-snap_ that gets her attention. In the relative silence, broken only by the sounds of crunching and chewing, Kristoff can make out the slowing of Anna's breathing, and imagines her gaze softening, her silent recognition of the folly of her impetuous words.

Right on cue, Anna bends down next to him. "Got any more?" she asks without looking at him. Her hand is ready for the carrot he presses into it, his fingers brushing her palm like a whisper of warmth.

Anna giggles a little as she lets Sven snuffle at the carrot, which rests atop her open palm. There are fine whiskers around the reindeer's mouth, that tickle her delicate skin.

After a moment, he starts talking in a soothing, slow voice. They are words that first occurred to him when he found himself at the royal gravesite in the morning, but that only seem right to say in this situation, with her. "The King and Queen — your parents, I mean... they were always so kind. When I was growing up, they would give out rations to those who needed them, even people who didn't live in Arendelle per se." Kristoff can feel Anna's gaze on him now, but he keeps watching the carrot rapidly disappearing into Sven's mouth. "Those carrots weren't a lot, but on some occasions they made all the difference to me and Sven." He almost smiles at the memory, although there's a hard edge to his mouth. "It, uh, took me a while to get strong and skillful enough to harvest ice efficiently," he adds, a statement that seems to gloss over more details than it reveals.

"We're indebted to each other's parents then," Anna notes after a moment. Sven has consumed most of the carrot already, his teeth working fast as he takes advantage of the opportunity for an extra treat.

Kristoff's taken aback by her comment. His mind returns to Elsa's revelation to him in the early morning hours. _Does Anna remember any of that?_

"The trolls... really live up to the 'love expert' reputation," Anna explains. Her cheeks flush and she withdraws her hand shyly as Sven finishes his snack.

"Oh," Kristoff says quietly as he realizes what she means. His brow furrows as he wonders briefly whether he should tell Anna the reason for Elsa's protectiveness. But it seems like something the two sisters should work out together; and besides, Anna's ire is not long behind her. She could flare up again.

Even as he thinks this, unbidden, the memory of Anna falling into his arms ice-cold and shivering, rises in his mind. A shadow crosses his visage; and it is this darkness, so out of place on Kristoff's usually warm, open face, that attracts her concern now. "Kristoff?" Anna probes worriedly. She looks properly at his face now, examining it and noting the dark circles under his eyes, the slightly bloodshot whites. "Did you get any sleep last night? You look really tired."

Kristoff forces a smile. "I'm just... worried about the people who fell sick because of the temperature changes." At her look he elaborates, "Many kids couldn't handle the summer-winter-summer fluctuations. Especially on the poorer side of town. They were already malnourished to begin with, their immunity's terrible." His voice is soft and sad as he says all this, and watching him, Anna wonders how many of those children Kristoff knows personally.

There's also something off about the way he says it, something that tips her off to his not telling the truth. But she lets it go, persuaded of his lie by the tone of genuine concern that sounds through. Concern for the sick children, but also concern for Anna, because in his mind, the memories, the nightmares, are still replaying: racing down the mountains on Sven, feeling the whipping wind but ignoring it in lieu of the horrendously cold body held against his chest... running across the frozen fjords towards Anna thinking _If only for a moment, Anna, love me back. Because I want you to live. I need you to live._

_Because I would want to be your true love even if you weren't mine._

But then she's taking his hand and squeezing it, and when he looks up at her, she says, "I'd love to go help out at the physician's. Come on."

And he can feel her smile, patient and infectious, so he gives her a small one in return, the shadows withdrawing from his expression. They are both haunted, both setting aside the personal demons they cannot, for the moment, fight. At least not alone.

Sven has long finished his breakfast, so Kristoff climbs on, then offers a hand up. Anna ignores it, jumps on herself and though she hesitates a moment — Kristoff can think of one other time he's hesitated like that — wraps her arms around him.

* * *

**You know the kid at the beginning of the film who complains about having to dress up for Elsa's coronation? Need a name for him. And random other kiddy-sounding names!**

**m.e.**


	7. Chapter 7 (Day After Thawing VI)

Wearily, Anna wipes the perspiration off her forehead with the back of her hand. As she straightens up from her hunched-over position, which she assumed to better reach down into a cot and dab with a wet cloth at a feverish child's forehead, she wobbles a little on her feet. She casts a furtive glance in Kristoff's direction, and breathes a sigh of relief when she sees that he is preoccupied with creating a fresh poultice for a middle-aged woman, one of Arendelle's best bakers allegedly, who slipped on ice when leaving her house to make bread deliveries to neighbors who needed provisions to get through the seemingly endless, unnatural winter Elsa set off.

Over their afternoon at the kingdom's main medical centre, Kristoff has surprised her mildly with his workable knowledge of herbs and human physiology. Whereas Anna required an instructional briefing from the physician before setting to work with even basic nursing tasks, Kristoff jumped straight into describing a type of flower petal he knew could help ease pain, and suggesting this be included in the mixture the physician was concocting at the time of their arrival. Although he does not know the names of things, Kristoff has some idea of how to treat minor wounds with natural plants, having learnt how to self-medicate in part from the trolls and in part by himself, over his years of solitary living.

Despite his concentration, however, Kristoff regularly glances across the stuffy room at Anna, at first to give her an encouraging smile, but later to surreptitiously check on how tired she's getting. Even now, as if sensing her gaze on him, he looks up from his work and scans her expression for subtle hints of her latent physical weakness catching up to her. He briefly reminds the baker how often to renew the poultice, then walks over to Anna.

She busies herself again, reaching down into the bucket of cool water at her feet and noting out loud to him, "Ten minutes ago this was the last of the ice. We're running low."

Kristoff nods dismissively, aware that since ice-gathering trips take more than a few hours, there is nothing they can do about the shortage. "We'll make do. How're you holding up?" He hesitates a little before asking, wary of her impatient brusqueness.

"I'll make do," Anna counters stubbornly, lifting her bucket and pushing it into his hands. "Could you get more spring water? It's cooler than the village pump, and little Percy's fever seems just about to break." She looks fondly down at the six-year-old orphan boy lying in the cot. She doesn't technically know what his name is, if he has one officially at all, but his curly, dark brown hair and suntanned face somehow say 'Percy' to her.

Reluctant to leave her, but with a sense of purpose, Kristoff consents and turns away. But as he's approaching the door to the general ward, a frantic-looking man bursts in. "Please, you have to help me," he cries urgently, grabbing hold of Kristoff's shirt and clutching it so hard, his knuckles turn white. "My son — the physician gave him medicine but—"

Alarmed, Anna looks up to watch the scene. They are not the only volunteers at work, but having seen Kristoff first, the man has latched onto him desperately.

Kristoff's hushing the man, soothing him as he would a child. "Alright, don't panic. Let's go to your son, and we'll see if we can't do something." He half-follows, half-leads the man out the door, setting the bucket down first to place both his large hands comfortingly on his shoulders.

Meeting someone's eye in a silent handover of her Percy-nursing duties, Anna follows in their urgent footsteps, frowning and worried at the strain in the father's voice. The knot in her throat only thickens and throbs harder when she realizes they are heading into the isolated rooms, and infers from this fact just how serious the patient's condition must be to warrant this treatment.

They hear as they approach the open doorway the sounds of miserable retching, and a maternal voice cooing senseless comforts. Rounding the corner, Anna takes in the sight of a little boy, perhaps nine years old, swathed in bed-sheets and the stench of his own vomit, sitting before a large galvanized pail. He looks faint, relying on his mother and the large pillow at his back to keep somewhat upright. "But I don't wanna dress up for her coronation..." he murmurs deliriously, and the plump woman behind him, his mother, soothes him and rubs his back in little circles. A helplessness lurks behind her every movement, and when she hears their approach, she looks up, warily hopeful.  
"He can't keep down any medicine with his fever so high," she tells them, not even questioning who Kristoff and Anna are. She pauses a moment to wipe the sweat and saliva off his face with her grubby dress sleeve, even as dry heaves wrack his small frame again. Then she directs her words to Kristoff in particular, a faint recognition bright in her eyes behind her despair. "Please, you have to get him cool. I know you, you're the ice harvester who brings chips of ice for the kids in the square when it's hot out. You have a kind heart. Please."

A barrage of thoughts races through Kristoff's mind, foremost of which is that he'd never make it back from an ice trip in time to help. Quickly he reaches forward and presses a palm to the boy's burning forehead: at this rate, he thinks, they don't have much time to break the fever. Even now, the boy begins to sway, as if about to lose consciousness.

Anna meanwhile reaches for a pail of water by the bedside, dipping a finger in to gauge its temperature. Next to her, the boy's mother reveals scrunched up in her hand momentarily the cloth she has been using to sponge his head. When Anna takes it and attempts to do the same, the fabric turns hot dishearteningly quickly.

Her mouth is set in a grim line as she turns to Kristoff — only to find him already gone, dashing off, as they both know is necessary, to find Elsa. She turns back to the family. "Help is coming, I promise," she says, then pauses a moment thinking how strange it is that the words sound less hollow the more she repeats them mentally. She says it again as if reassurance can be derived simply from reiteration. "What's his name?" Anna asks then, concealing her frown as she dips the cloth in the only marginally cooler water from the pail, and as her patient shudders and goes alarmingly still for a moment before drawing another shallow breath.

"Tommy," the father replies hollowly from across the room. He's stayed by the doorframe, she realizes now, clutching onto it as if for support. "His name is Tommy."

* * *

**New school year is turning out to be really stressful for me. Really uncertain about the future of this fic.**

**m.e.**


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